Bell’s Issues Response on Innovation Trademark Dispute

Bell’s Brewery released a statement today on its Facebook page in response to the news that the brewery filed a federal action against a small North Carolina brewery over a trademark dispute.

According to the release from Bell’s Vice President Laura Bell, the Michigan-based brewery has no plans to sue Innovation Brewing of Sylva, NC. Bell’s is seeking to have Innovation withdraw its federal trademark application for its name. Bell’s uses the slogan “bottling innovation since 1985” in some of its marketing materials.

Read the complete statement below.

To our Bell’s customers and the passionate craft beer community,

We want to clear up a few things regarding our federal trademark dispute with Innovation Brewing.

1. We have not, and are not asking them to change their name or their logo. There is no lawsuit. We are not suing them. We have not asked them for money. We have not asked them to stop selling their beer. We are asking them to withdraw their federal trademark application.

2. Our concern is with their United States trademark application and potential impact on our brand, which we have spent 30 years building.

3. I personally reached out to Innovation Brewing to try to settle this matter in February, 2014 and attempted to talk about this brewer to brewer instead of involving lawyers. Our efforts were rebuffed and Innovation Brewing choose to pursue this in the legal system.

4. Over the last year, we have offered co-existence agreements and have offered to pay for their legal fees. We tried to find solutions that would work for both of us. Their response was to ask for an exorbitant amount of money and we did not feel that was a collaborative solution.

5. All offers that we proposed were rejected and after more than a year of discussion regrettably, this matter has moved to the federal trademark office.

We have the utmost respect for Innovation Brewing and we are going to keep any comments we have regarding this matter positive, honest, and collaborative. We want them to continue to brew and do the good work they’re doing under their own name.

We hope to resolve this as swiftly as the system will allow.

The passion that we have seen over the past few days is a testament to how much the beer industry means to those who support it and why we are proud to be a part of it. We always appreciate further feedback and invite everyone to continue to share their concerns with us directly: http://bellsbeer.com/contact/

Very interesting. And there are two sides to every story. The version earlier this week that Bells was suing Innovation didn’t make sense to me. Let’s hope both parties come to for a mutually-agreeable solution, and continue to produce excellent beers.

Nice try, we still will back them no matter how much honey you put on the bitter tasting biscuit you want the masses to swallow. Lawsuit or not, who cares if you ask them to pull out the application, its their right to try for it and your impedance only swells the ranks of those who are loyal to their brand and subsequently, adds more and more backers every day this circus show continues. Nice try, but take note on your sales over these next few months because WNC is definitely going to be red flag for your distribution.

If they were interested in resolving the issues “as swiftly as the system will allow,” why did they refuse requests for scheduling orders that would quicken the process? The tactics Bell’s legal team has employed goes against everything Laura attempts to claim in this statement. The deep-pocket bullying that we are witnessing from Bell’s is precisely what destroys any notion of a level playing field in a free market economy.

Even Taylor Swift trademarked words from her album before it came out i.e. “This Sick Beat”). I think Bell’s is ~trying~ to be noble, but they should really be embarrassed their lawyer didn’t trademark a bumper sticker. Is this the same lawyer representing Bell’s on this issue now? I guess Innovation will win then.